1) The U.S. Department of Justice

“Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter…especially after I heard about that crazy sh#! being pulled by the DOJ.” -Thomas Jefferson

The Obama administration has been especially aggressive in pursuing legal action against those who leak classified information. Indeed, the current administration has pursued more prosecutions for leaks under the Espionage Act than all previous administrations combined. Admittedly, finding the proper balance between freedom of the press and effective law enforcement is a difficult endeavor, particularly when the crime is leaking classified information. The government surely has a legitimate interest in identifying those disclosing such information. Yet if the press is to fulfill its role as a government watchdog and report what it sees to the public at large, it has to be able to assure its sources of confidentiality.

To assist in maintaining a proper balance between these competing interests, the DOJ adheres to a number of procedural safeguards when an investigation involves members of the press. For example, before the DOJ seeks a subpoena for press phone records, it will first make “all reasonable attempts” to get the desired information from other sources and/or negotiate a release of the desired records with the organization itself. If these efforts fail and a subpoena becomes necessary, that subpoena will “be as narrowly drawn as possible” and “should be directed at relevant information regarding a limited subject matter and should cover a reasonably limited time period.”

In light of these guidelines, the Associated Press (“AP”) and the media at large were understandably taken aback when it was revealed in May 2013 that the DOJ had obtained two months’ worth of AP telephone records from communications giant Verizon based on subpoenas sought and issued in secret. The disclosed records included the cellular, office, and home telephones of individual reporters and an editor; AP office numbers in Washington, New York, and Hartford, Conn.; and the main number for AP reporters covering Congress.

Gary Pruitt, President and CEO of the AP, called the DOJ’s actions a “massive and unprecedented intrusion” into newsgathering activities. In a letter to the Attorney General, Pruitt charged that the subpoenas had “no possible justification” and were “a serious interference with AP’s constitutional rights to gather and report the news.” In Congress, Republicans and Democrats alike decried perceived abuses. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) argued that the DOJ’s investigation was “contrary to the law and standard procedure.” Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) stated that “the actions of the department have in fact impaired the First Amendment.” Ranking Democrat John Conyers (D-MI) said that he was “deeply troubled by the notion that our government would secretly pursue such a broad array of media phone records over such a long period of time.”

Deputy Attorney General James Cole, responded to the criticism in a letter stating that the subpoenas “were limited in both time and scope,” and issued only after a “comprehensive investigation.” Cole’s defense was somewhat undercut, however, by the fact that one of the subpoenaed phone lines had been shut down years earlier—the sort of detail one might expect a comprehensive DOJ investigation to uncover.

James Rosen

Just a few days after the AP subpoenas became public knowledge, it was learned that the DOJ had also secretly sought and obtained from Google two months’ of emails from the Gmail account of Fox News’ chief Washington correspondent, James Rosen regarding a report by Rosen containing information allegedly leaked to him by State Department advisor Stephen Kim. Unlike the AP phone records that only provided information about phone calls (i.e., the incoming or outgoing number, as well as the date, time, and length of calls), some of the information sought on Rosen involved the content of the reporter’s communications. The DOJ obtained two full days’ worth of Rosen’s emails, as well as all of his emails with Kim. The Washington Post wrote, “court documents in the Kim case reveal how deeply investigators explored the private communications of a working journalist.”

Because the DOJ was seeking the content of Rosen’s communications, it needed a court-issued search warrant, as opposed to a subpoena, which would only have required an allegation that the information sought was relevant to an investigation. Pursuant to the Privacy Protection Act, the government was required to establish that probable cause existed to believe the reporter had committed or was committing a criminal offense under the Espionage Act to which the needed materials related. To overcome this hurdle, the DOJ characterized James Rosen as a “criminal co-conspirator.” That fact bears repeating: The federal government labeled a reporter a criminal for merely doing his job.

What was truly shameful about the DOJ’s investigation was that it never actually considered Rosen a criminal co-conspirator; the accusation was merely a means by which to circumvent the requirements of the Privacy Protection Act. In a letter to Congress, Attorney General Eric Holder stated, “the government’s decision to seek this search warrant was an investigative step, and at no time during this matter have prosecutors sought approval from me to bring criminal charges against the reporter.”

The political backlash to the revelations of the AP subpoenas and the Rosen search warrant resulted in the Justice Department working with representatives of the press in early 2014 to draft new guidelines that tighten government access to journalists’ records. Although the DOJ is to be commended for the new guidelines, the protections they provide are not absolute and some significant exceptions exist that, if exploited, could result in a repeat of last year’s shameful actions. Should such temptation ever arise, we hope this 2014 Jefferson Muzzle will inspire the Department of Justice to fully consider the importance of a free press to our nation.

2) The White House Press Office

Today’s images include an 8” x 10” of the President making a 3-pointer on the basketball court.

In November 2013, a group of 38 media organizations came together to protest an Obama White House policy that dramatically limited professional photojournalists’ access to the President. According to these groups—among them, major broadcast and cable networks, newspapers such as The Washington Post and The New York Times, the National Press Club, and the Associated Press—journalists are routinely prevented from taking pictures of President Obama while he is performing his official duties because the White House categorizes such events as “private,” thereby baring media access. Then, adding insult to injury, the White House releases official photographs of these supposedly private affairs to millions of followers across various social media platforms.

Journalists have been butting heads with the Obama White House ever since press corps photographers were prohibited from documenting the President’s first day in office. In fact, during his first five years in office, the White House has permitted photography of President Obama alone inside the Oval Office only twice: during telephone calls in 2009 and 2010. Photos of the President and his staff working together in the Oval Office have never been allowed, even though such pictures were routine in the past.

The White House counters that it has released more images of the President at work than any previous administration. While that may be true, the journalistic value of such photographs is a product of their content, not quantity. Writing in The New York Times, the current director of photography for the Associated Press, Santiago Lyon suggested that these glossy official images are at best, visual press releases, and at worst, pure propaganda masquerading as news. By curtailing access to the Oval Office, the White House effectively ensures a visual narrative that “shows the president in the best possible light” and “propagates an idealized portrayal of events on Pennsylvania Avenue.”

For systematically rejecting independent journalistic access in favor of its own sanitized visual record, the White House Press Office has earned a 2014 Jefferson Muzzle.

3) The National Security Agency and Department of Homeland Security

The NSA: The only part of government that actually listens.

Dan McCall sells T-shirts, mugs, posters, and other products through the website Zazzle.com. Imprinted on his merchandise are humorous images and messages, often of a political nature. One of McCall’s designs juxtaposed an image of the National Security Agency’s (“NSA”) official seal with the words, “Spying On You Since 1952.” Another design featured an altered version of the NSA seal immediately above the words, “The NSA: The only part of government that actually listens.” The Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) was also a target for parody, with McCall altering the official DHS seal to read, “Department of Homeland Stupidity.”

The NSA and the DHS were not amused. In 2011, both entities sent cease and desist letters to Zazzle.com threatening legal action if the website did not remove the three designs described above. The NSA claimed McCall’s designs violated a federal law making it a criminal offense to misuse the NSA trademark. DHS cited a federal law prohibiting the alteration of a seal of any department or agency of the United States. Essentially, these laws are aimed at preventing the public from attributing the messages of others to government agencies. In response to the cease and desist letters, Zazzle removed the contested products from its website for the rest of 2011, and all of 2012-13 effectively denying McCall any income from the designs during that period. Represented by Paul Levy of Public Citizen Litigation Group, McCall filed a lawsuit in October 2013 against the NSA and DHS asserting his First Amendment right to parody the two agencies in the manner that he had.

At the core of the First Amendment is the right to criticize the government without fear of punishment or retribution. Any law passed by the government must be interpreted to comport with that constitutional tenant. In addition, the landmark 1987 U.S. Supreme Court case of Jerry Falwell v. Hustler Magazine and Larry Flynt clearly established that parody and satire enjoyed full First Amendment protection. Here, the facts were such that the only plausible explanation for the agencies’ cease and desist letters was to suppress government criticism. No reasonable person would believe that the designs were affiliated with, or supported by, the NSA or DHS.

Apparently the Public Citizen lawsuit convinced the two agencies of the error of their ways and, early in 2014, they settled the lawsuit agreeing not to press charges based on McCall’s designs. Although it is commendable that the NSA and DHS recognized McCall’s First Amendment rights, it took them almost 3 years to do so and only after they were sued. Moreover, the laws under which they threatened McCall are still on the books. McCall’s attorney Paul Levy concedes that it remains an open question whether, and in what situations, the government might attempt to suppress other uses of official seals. In hopes that the NSA and DHS will fully consider First Amendment principles before sending any more cease and desist letters over the use of their official seals, the two agencies are awarded a 2014 Jefferson Muzzle.

4) The North Carolina General Assembly Police

Get the Funk out of here.

In early 2013, the North Carolina General Assembly passed a series of budget cutting bills perceived by some as unfairly targeting programs for the poor. In protest, the state chapter of the NAACP, members of the clergy from a variety of denominations, and groups of concerned citizens began staging demonstrations in the lobby of the General Assembly, the home of the state legislature. Although public access to the building is permitted, once inside, it is unlawful to disrupt the business of the General Assembly or to engage in disorderly conduct. By June, the demonstrations had become a regular weekly event known as “Moral Mondays” during which protesters would gather to sing, pray, and be arrested by the General Assembly Police. So routine were the arrests that protesters who wanted to be arrested were advised to wear green armbands so they could be distinguished from crowds of onlookers and supporters.

On June 10, the Charlotte Observer sent reporter Tim Funk to Raleigh to cover one of the protests. Funk covered faith and values for the newspaper and wanted to speak with clergymen from the Charlotte area. As Funk was doing so, General Assembly Police Chief Jeff Weaver warned the protesters to disperse or face arrest. That Funk was a reporter and not a protester was readily apparent; he had press credentials around his neck and a pad and pen in his hands. Yet when the police moved in, they went directly for Funk. “Chief Weaver came straight for me,” said Funk. “I remember that I kept saying, ‘I’m a reporter, I’m a reporter.’ But the chief kept coming at me, kept saying, ‘You’re under arrest; put your hands behind your back.’” Officers zip-tied Funk’s hands and led him to a detention center. “I told every uniformed person I saw that I was a reporter, there to cover the protest, not participate in it,” Funk said. “I also asked several times whether I could call the Observer. They said ‘no.’ I asked if they could call the Observer. ‘No.’ At one point, my cellphone rang. I asked if they could answer it or put it to my ear. ‘No.’” Funk was then locked in a detention cell for two hours before being taken before a magistrate and released.

Had the General Assembly Police arrested Funk because he was causing a disturbance, or even because they mistakenly took him for a protester, a Muzzle probably would not be warranted. But neither scenario existed here. A documentary film crew happened to be filming in the General Assembly on June 10 and caught Funk’s arrest on video. When Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby saw the video, he immediately dismissed the charges. “I saw a video of the incident and it appeared to me that he was there as a reporter, and not part of the protest. He was doing his job,” Willoughby said.

Mr. Willoughby is exactly right. It is the job of a free press to watch over the government and report on what it sees to the public at large. As Thomas Jefferson wrote, “An informed citizenry is the bulwark of a democracy.” In hopes that it will serve as a reminder of the importance of a free press to a democratic society, the North Carolina General Assembly Police Department is awarded a 2014 Jefferson Muzzle.

5) The Kansas Board of Regents

Toto, I’ve a feeling this isn’t the Kansas we know anymore.

On the morning of September 16, 2013, a lone gunman fatally shot twelve people and injured three others at the headquarters of the Naval Sea Systems Command inside the Washington D.C. Naval Yard. That same afternoon, University of Kansas associate professor David Guth logged into his personal Twitter account and sent the following message: “The blood is on the hands of the #NRA. Next time let it be YOUR sons and daughters. Shame on you. May God damn you.”

Almost immediately, the NRA and others offended by the tweet began calling for the University of Kansas to fire or otherwise reprimand Guth. Some state legislators reportedly stated that they would vote to discontinue funding the university if Guth was not terminated. The university administration resisted these calls stating, “Faculty have their own social media accounts and use those to express personal opinions, but those opinions do not represent the university.” After receiving a number of death threats, however, Guth was placed on administrative leave. He was later assigned to non-teaching duties for the rest of the fall and would remain out of the classroom for the spring 2014 semester because of a previously planned sabbatical.

David Guth

In response to the controversy, the Kansas Board of Regents, a nine-member governing body that oversees the state’s six public universities and some 30 community and technical colleges, voted unanimously to approve a new social media policy that gives the chief executive officer of each institution discretion to discipline or terminate any faculty or staff member for “improper use of social media.” The policy goes on to state that “improper use” includes acting “contrary to the best interests of the university,” and having “a detrimental impact on close working relationships for which personal loyalty and confidence are necessary.

The Regents adopted this first-of-its-kind policy without consulting university leaders or faculty who, unsurprisingly, were not pleased. The president of Kansas State University wrote the Regents to inform them that “many members of the K-state family feel the policy seriously curtails both academic freedom and free speech.” The University of Kansas Faculty Senate requested that the Regents immediately rescind the policy until a new one could be drafted with faculty input. Reaction to the policy from national academic freedom advocates was also negative. The American Association of University Professors described the policy as “a gross violation of the fundamental principles of academic freedom that have been a cornerstone of American higher education for nearly a century,” while the Student Press Law Center warned that the “breathtaking” sweep of the regulation evidenced “an eagerness to control the off-the-clock lives of employees that is itself cause for suspicion.”

To their credit, in January 2014 the Regents created a workgroup of public university faculty and staff to review the Board’s new policy and make recommendations for changes. That report is to be presented to the Regents by April 16. It is very troubling, however, that the Regents refused to suspend their policy while the workgroup prepares its report. As a result, employees of three dozen educational institutions are left in the dark as to exactly what they can and cannot say on their personal social media accounts. Moreover, it is not at all certain that the Regents will adopt any or all of the workgroup’s recommendations.

Guth’s tweet may have been many things: intentionally provocative, ill-conceived, poorly-worded, even offensive. Nevertheless, it was also undeniably his personal opinion about a hotly debated political issue. The Supreme Court has consistently held that First Amendment rights are at their zenith when political speech is involved and nowhere is the vigilant protection of those rights more vital than at our colleges and universities. Social media is an increasingly common element of these educational environments, as Facebook, Twitter, and other platforms replace the syllabus and office hours as hubs of interaction among professors and their students. This presents new challenges for administrators, to be sure, but no modern university system can avoid the issue. The only question is whether or not their approach will be respectful of protected speech.

The Board of Regents could have issued a strong signal of support for the principles of academic freedom and free expression by suspending the current social media policy and pledging to implement the workgroup’s recommendations. Instead, 36 member schools are left sitting below a virtual sword of Damocles, waiting to see how—or even if—the Regents will remove it. This 2014 Jefferson Muzzle is therefore awarded to the Kansas Board of Regents in hopes that First Amendment principles will guide them in resolving this issue as well as those they may face in the future.

6) Modesto Junior College

Taking the Constitution out of Constitution Day

On September 17, 1787, the delegates to the Constitutional Convention met for the last time to sign the document they had created. Two hundred and seventeen years later, Congress passed a law designating September 17 as “Constitution Day” and mandating that all publicly funded schools provide educational programming on the history of the United States Constitution on that day.

Apparently the administration of Modesto Junior College didn’t get the memo.

Located in Modesto, California, Modesto Junior College (“MJC”) is a publicly funded institution with an enrollment of approximately 18,000 day and evening students. To celebrate Constitution Day 2013, MJC student Robert Van Tuinen stood outside the student center passing out free copies of the U.S. Constitution. After about ten minutes, Van Tuinen was approached by a campus police officer who told him that the only place he was allowed to hand out materials on the 58.3 acre campus was a small concrete space designated as the “free speech area,” and even then only if he first scheduled it through the Student Development office. Van Tuinen went to the office where he was instructed to fill out an application and told that the next available dates to use the “free speech area” were September 20 or 27, or some dates in October. None of these alternatives were satisfactory to Van Tuinen who specifically chose September 17—Constitution Day—to distribute copies of the Constitution.

Public colleges and universities such as MJC may surely protect their educational activities, ensure equal access to scarce facilities, and impose content-neutral time, place, and manner regulations designed to maintain safety and order. But in designating a single free speech area on campus, the MJC administration got it backwards: free speech on a public college campus is not the exception but the rule. Restrictions of expressive activity must be limited to specific areas and are permissible only if justified by an overriding need.

The MJC administration had to learn this lesson the hard way. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) recruited the law firm of Davis Wright Tremaine to represent Van Tuinen in a lawsuit against the school for violating his First Amendment rights. As a result of that lawsuit, Van Tuinen received $50,000 in damages and MJC agreed to abolish the procedure necessitating administrative permission for free-speech activities, allow free expression in all “areas generally available to students and the community,” and never reinstitute its old policy.

To be fair, MJC is not the only public college that has attempted to limit expressive activity to specific parts of campus. Indeed, research by FIRE concludes that as many as 1 in 6 colleges maintain similar “free speech zones.” In addition to being clearly unconstitutional, these zones are antithetical to the traditional notion of the academy as a home for the free exchange of ideas. What sets MJC apart from these other schools is that it was forewarned. There was a compelling, unique, and obvious clue that its policy was unconstitutional; namely, that enforcement of its policy prohibited a student from handing out copies of the U.S. Constitution on Constitution Day! For failing to pick up on this tell-tale sign, the Modesto Junior College administration earns a 2014 Jefferson Muzzle.

7) The Tennessee State Legislature

Cows have privacy rights too, you know.

There is a theory that if you enjoy eating sausage, and you want to continue eating it, then you should never see how it is made. Judging by the plethora of laws proposed and enacted in a number of states that make it illegal to covertly record audio or video of livestock operations, many in the meat producing industry believe that seeing how animals are turned into food would turn a significant number of their carnivorous consumers into vegetarians. Known as “ag-gag” laws by their detractors, seven states already have them on the books and fifteen more were proposed in 2013. Though they vary from state to state, these laws typically include the prohibition of covert recordings noted above, and penalties for those who apply for agricultural employment with the intent to make such recordings or without disclosing ties to animal rights groups. Of the fifteen ag-gag bills proposed last year, only one was actually passed by a state legislature. That bill, sponsored by two Tennessee legislators with strong ties to agribusiness, is illustrative of how ag-gag laws come to be and the risk they pose to constitutionally protected speech.

The history of ag-gag legislation in Tennessee can be traced back to a video recorded in 2011 by undercover investigators from the Humane Society exposing horrific abuses occurring at stables belonging to renowned walking horse trainer Jackie McConnell. The video showed workers applying caustic chemicals and metal chains to the horses’ ankles. This illegal technique, known as “soring,” is meant to exaggerate the distinctive gait favored by walking horse breeders. Another worker was shown striking a horse in the head with a large piece of wood. The Humane Society turned the video over to authorities and federal charges were eventually filed, leading to guilty pleas from McConnell and the abusive employees. Prosecutors said that the Humane Society investigation was instrumental in bringing the abuse to light and providing the evidence necessary to punish the offenders.

Having observed the threat posed by unflattering undercover activism, Sen. Dolores Gresham, a stockyard owner, and Rep. Andy Holt, a pig farmer with ties to the nation’s largest farm lobbying group, sponsored a bill that sought to cripple future investigations by criminalizing the act of applying for a job with the intent of documenting animal abuses. When that bill failed to pass in 2012, Gresham and Holt returned the following year with an amendment to Tennessee’s animal cruelty statute. The amendment required anyone who intentionally recorded video of livestock abuse or animal cruelty for the purpose of documenting such abuse to turn the recordings over to law enforcement officials within 48 hours or face misdemeanor charges.

Proponents of the bill claimed its purpose was to ensure the prompt reporting of animal cruelty to law enforcement. The irony of that claim is crushing. Anyone familiar with the bill and its sponsors knew that the true purpose was to prevent animal-rights activists from making more videos like the one that brought down Jackie McConnell. If preventing animal cruelty was the legislature’s goal, why limit the reporting requirement to those who intentionally set out to document abuse rather than applying it broadly to anyone who witnessed an act of animal cruelty? On its face, the Gresham and Holt bill sought to eliminate the ability of animal activists to gather the type of evidence necessary to establish patterns of abuse, leaving offenders free to claim that any videos that did surface depicted only isolated incidents of bad behavior.

The true purpose of the bill was further evidenced by the actions of one of its sponsors. When a Humane Society employee emailed legislators encouraging them to oppose the law, Rep. Holt sent a reply, calling the Humane Society a “fraudulent and reprehensibly disgusting organization of maligned animal abuse profiteering corporatists . . . intent on using animals the same way human-traffickers use 17 year old women.” Holt added that he was pleased that the employee’s “pathetic excuse for an organization,” would no longer be able to engage in a practice he described as “tape and rape.” The acerbic hog farmer later got into a fight on Twitter with Carrie Underwood. After the country music star sent a tweet to her 1.5 million followers expressing disappointment in the lawmakers who passed the bill, Holt tweeted back that Underwood should “stick to singing” and leave the politics to him.

Although Tennessee’s ag-gag bill passed the General Assembly in April 2013, it still needed Governor Bill Haslam’s signature to become law. Haslam faced heavy pressure from individuals and organizations nationwide to veto the bill, but was openly sympathetic to those members of his community who felt “besieged” by activist campaigns. “As our state and country become more urban,” he noted, “there are just more people who don’t understand what standard agricultural practice looks like.” These concerns, however, were ultimately not enough to satisfy Gov. Haslam and Attorney General Robert E. Cooper, Jr. In an advisory opinion issued at Haslam’s request, Cooper concluded that a court could find the bill to be unconstitutional both as a prior restraint on speech and a burden on news gathering. Convinced that the law was “constitutionally suspect,” Gov. Haslam vetoed it.

As noted above, Tennessee is hardly the first state to propose or even pass ag-gag legislation. Singling out the General Assembly for a Muzzle may therefore seem unfair. Yet of all the bills proposed in 2013, reporting requirements of the sort found in the Tennessee bill are uniquely troubling from a First Amendment point of view. Furthermore, it came the closest to actually becoming law. Within hours of Governor Haslam’s veto, Sen. Gresham and Rep. Holt vowed to introduce new ag-gag legislation in the next session. In hopes that its members will give greater consideration to First Amendment principles when this new bill is introduced, the Tennessee General Assembly is presented with a 2014 Jefferson Muzzle.

8) Wharton High School Principal Brad Woods

SALUTATORIAN: Latin for “short leash”

The tradition of high school valedictorians and salutatorians speaking at their graduation ceremony is a long and proud one. Unfortunately, more and more schools, including Tampa, Florida’s Wharton High School, are establishing a new tradition—one requiring that any student speaking at graduation must clear the exact text of his speech with a school administrator prior to the ceremony.

In April 2013, Wharton salutatorian Harold Shaw Jr. began writing the speech he was to deliver at his upcoming graduation ceremony in June. Shaw’s first draft included a reference to what he believed were the unsanitary condition of the school’s restrooms. When school administrators rejected his initial effort, Shaw submitted a second draft that did not mention the restrooms. Even without the reference, however, Shaw was informed his latest draft would not be approved unless additional changes were made. Shaw complied and school officials finally approved his speech in mid-May.

Wharton High School’s graduation ceremony was held on June 3, 2013 at the Florida State Fairgrounds Expo Hall. In a deep, loud, and enthusiastic voice, Shaw began delivering his speech from the stage set up for the occasion. Sitting behind Shaw on stage were a number of school officials, including Wharton High School Principal Brad Woods. In a video of the ceremony, Principal Woods appears to be reading a draft of the speech as Shaw delivers it. Several minutes into the speech, Shaw stumbles over a few words but quickly recovers and returns to the approved text in a few seconds.

Yet even this brief departure from the approved script caused Principal Woods to spring into action. The instant Shaw stumbled over his speech, the principal stood up and, looking offstage, made a slicing gesture with his hand across his neck, signaling to the sound technician to cut the power to Shaw’s microphone. Baffled, Shaw looked around to see Principal Woods walk to another lectern, say “Thank you, Harold,” and then proceed to introduce the class valedictorian even though Shaw was only halfway through his speech. Not understanding what was happening nor why, Shaw returned to his seat. Following the ceremony, Shaw was asked to leave the Expo Hall and was escorted out by two sheriff’s deputies. He was not allowed to receive his diploma with his classmates but instead had to pick it up at the high school a few days later.

Principal Woods has yet to publicly explain his actions but Shaw thinks he knows what was behind them: the poor condition of the Wharton High School restrooms, or more accurately, Shaw’s efforts to focus public attention on the restrooms. After his statement about the restrooms was stricken from the first draft of his speech, Shaw decided to make a video on the restrooms’ deficiencies and post it on Facebook. Shaw believes that the graduation incident was retribution for the video.

Regardless of the specific reason, however, Principal Woods was so determined to control what was said at the graduation ceremony that he was willing to ruin a watershed moment in a young person’s life by embarrassing him in front of his family, friends, and classmates. Such a consequence seems excessive even if Shaw had departed from the approved text. Moreover, this was a student with the second highest GPA of his graduating class. He earned the right to deliver his full speech, or at the very least, an explanation as to why he was not allowed to finish. Principal Brad Woods ensured that Harold Shaw would receive neither and in the process ensured his own selection as a recipient of a 2014 Jefferson Muzzle.

9) Pemberton Township High School Principal Ida Smith

None of the news that’s fit to print.

In the 1988 case of Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that public high school administrators enjoy relatively broad authority to control the content of school-sponsored publications, including school newspapers. Student-editors at Pemberton Township High School in New Jersey experienced the consequences of the Hazelwood decision first hand last fall, when officials censored three articles that were to appear in the school’s newspaper, The Stinger. The first article concerned students smoking in bathrooms on campus. By all accounts, the piece was well reasoned, researched, and written, but Principal Ida Smith refused to allow its publication. When members of The Stinger asked Smith to explain her decision, she declined to comment.

Another article slated for the same issue concerned the departure of the district’s athletic director but the final copy was edited by officials to remove two important lines: one indicating that the former director had declined to comment for the piece, and another noting that the district had yet to hire his replacement. According to Bill Garden, faculty advisor for The Stinger, removing these sentences only served to make the piece less journalistically sound because it eliminated a key acknowledgement that the student reporter had done her job and actually attempted to speak with the subject of the article. As before, Principal Smith offered no explanation for this editorial meddling.

Their journalistic endeavors frustrated, the students sought a means by which they could turn the experience into something positive. Two Stinger staff members proposed a story examining student expression rights and censorship issues. Once again, Principal Smith stepped in and—somehow avoiding being crushed under the weight of all the irony in the world—declared that no article concerning censorship of student publications would appear in The Stinger.

The students brought the matter to the attention of school district superintendent Michael Gorman, but to no avail. When asked to comment on the situation, Gorman claimed that district guidelines governing student publications were in place to preserve the “integrity of instructional process” and to ensure that student articles are “grounded in fact.” Gorman refused, however, to elaborate on how the censored articles were in any way contrary to the instructional process, or to identify any factual errors contained within them. This institutional reticence does little to dispel the belief that the actual motivating factor behind the censorship is a desire on the part of school officials to quash any article that threatens to cast the school or those who run it in a negative light.

Even if a court were to conclude that Principal Smith’s actions did not violate her students’ First Amendment rights, the culture of censorship that has emerged at Pemberton Township High School is still wrong. In their zeal to preserve the “integrity of instructional process,” school officials have offered students little reason to believe in the integrity of the constitutional principles of freedom of speech and freedom of the press.

For embracing a pattern of censorship that prioritizes public relations over academic and constitutional integrity, the Administration of Pemberton Township High School earns a 2014 Jefferson Muzzle.